Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) stilt, common name for some members of the family Recurvirostridae, shore birds including the avocet. Stilts, as their name implies, have the longest legs of any bird except the flamingo. They frequen...

(Encyclopedia) preventive medicine, branch of medicine dealing with the prevention of disease and the maintenance of good health practices. Until recently preventive medicine was largely the domain of the U.S. Publi...

(Encyclopedia) Prince William Sound, large, irregular, islanded inlet of the Gulf of Alaska, S Alaska, E of the Kenai peninsula. It has many bays and good harbors; the large Columbia Glacier flows into Columbia Bay,...

(Encyclopedia) trickster, a mythic figure common among Native North Americans, South Americans, and Africans. Usually male but occasionally female or disguised in female form, he is notorious for exaggerated biologi...

(Encyclopedia) Plunket orPlunkett, Saint Oliver, 1629–81, Irish Roman Catholic churchman and martyr, b. Co. Meath. He was educated at Rome and named Roman Catholic archbishop of Armagh and primate of all Ireland i...

(Encyclopedia) Pogodin, Nikolai fyôˈdərəvĭch sto͞okäˈlôf [key], 1900–1962, Russian dramatist. Pogodin wrote many colorful, optimistic, and popular plays generally dealing with the theme of man's conquest ...

(Encyclopedia) Gordin, Jacob Mikhailovich yäˈkôb mĭkhīˈləvyĭch gôrˈdĭn [key], 1853–1909, American writer of Yiddish plays, b. Russia. He was for some years a teacher and a newspaper writer in St. Peters...

(Encyclopedia) Gore, Charles, 1853–1932, English prelate and theologian. As the first principal (1884–93) of Pusey House, a theological center at Oxford, he was a leading figure in the High Church movement (see ...

(Encyclopedia) Defoe or De Foe, Daniel dĭfōˈ [key], 1660?–1731, English writer, b. London. He was nearly sixty when he turned to writing novels. In 1719 he published his famous Life and Strange Surprising Adv...

(Encyclopedia) Nietzsche, Friedrich Wilhelm frēˈdrĭkh vĭlˈhĕlm nēˈchə [key], 1844–1900, German philosopher, b. Röcken, Prussia. The son of a clergyman, Nietzsche studied Greek and Latin at Bonn and Leipz...